More buzz about Prop 13

As Californians waited and watched during the excruciating budget battle this year, more and more people are beginning to agree we have to look at Prop 13 again. The long-ago decision to cap property taxes and to demand a 2/3 vote to approve budget decisions has made California a failed state. Many citizens do not understand how the budget is arrived at and they continue to demand services without approving any move to raise money for them. We can't keep on getting a free lunch forever. No other state in the country has passed legislation that puts the government in such a bind as California's. Assembly Speaker Karen Bass speaks for many legislators when she says its time to put everything on the table. Next month's Tax Commission Report should give some indication of what the possibilities are. Let's calm down, take a look at the possibilities and make some sensible, grown-up decision about how the state will continue to function.

Good idea for nonprofits

With both city and state facing budget deficits, you'd think San Francisco could get its act together and make more responsible decisions about funding the city's nonprofit social agencies. But as columnist C.W. Nevius points out in the S.F. Chronicle, funding really depends on how effectively the nonprofits reps can beg from the supervisors and how much political clout they have. Is this any way to run a city? The political atmosphere of the funding leads to a duplication of efforts in some areas and a lack of them in others. It punishes responsible nonprofits which meet their goals and favors other that consistently fail in the tasks they take on. We can do better than that. As Nevius points out, improved accounting methods would make it possible to compare the records of nonprofits and target funding toward the ones which actually do what they promise. With so many new college graduates searching for jobs today, surely the city could set up an intern program to help nonprofits with their accounting. That would help build the students' resumes and help save the taxpayers money--not to mention providing better services for the needy.

Last chance for budget?

State legislators will vote this week on competing plans to "fix" California's budget problems. The S.F.Chronicle offers readers a handy chart comparing the two packages. The problem is that neither plan grapples with the measures needed to fix the budget permanently. Both of them push some expenses off into the future and make overly-optimistic predictions of how much money will be saved. The L.A. Times notes that Democrat's plan goes so far as to suggest paying state employees their June salaries just after midnight on July 1 so the expense is pushed into the next budget year. That's the old let's-pay-the-holiday-bills-in-January ploy that many households have tried only to find the bills are just as painful in the new year. To vote either one of these packages into law in time to save us from running out of money on July 1 will require a two-thirds majority. When are our representatives going to settle down and act like grown-ups?

Civilized, dignified healthcare may still be ours! (Action still required.)

It's been a dispiriting period for everyone who will ever need health care without the benefit of employer-provided insurance (that would be most of us), but the trajectory may reversing. We start from a low point: California's universal healthcare bill, SB810, was shelved due to fiscal worries. Of all things. Containing medical expense with preventive care and early treatment is part of a solution to individual, corporate, and government fiscal worries. Then, Congress said no, flat out, to single payer healthcare. Insurance companies protested they couldn't compete with a government program, and it would be socialism, too. Hmmmmmm. People agitated heartily, and Senator Baucus opened the door to at least considering single payer. The rhetoric intensified. I woke up earlier this week to NPR's Steve Inskeep badgering HHS Secretary Kathleen Sebelius to assure us there would be no single payer system . The Secretary obliged; he crowed. (Tell us what you really think, Mr. Inskeep. Now we understand why NPR describes you as a "personality" rather than a journalist.) It was depressing and distressing. But wait! Late in the week Senator Dodd, speaking for Senator Kennedy, called his colleagues to task for plans that would still leave millions without any health insurance, and would leave preventive or early treatment our out-of-pocket costs. There was a pause in the rush to publish something, anything, rather than a responsive, responsible proposal. Now, today. The NYT published a survey showing 72% of respondents back a public health care option. 64% of persons earning less than $50,000 (these are people with very little discretionary money, really) would be willing to pay higher taxes for universal health insurance. And, today, the Times ran a thoughtful editorial in full support of a public health insurance option, compared to the alternatives. I'm encouraged. But this is a fragile recovery. Let's keep speaking out for better, meaningful access to healthcare. Our voices make a difference. And our lives depend on it. (League Lady II)

On the street in San Francisco

On this pleasant Sunday when many of us are at home celebrating Father's Day with the family, it's particularly painful to think about people who not only have no family but don't even have a home. The S.F. Chronicle book review today calls attention to Righteous Dopefiend an important book of words and pictures by Philippe Bourgois and Jeff Schonberg. The authors tell the stories of addicts who are chronically homeless, who struggle to overcome addiction and find satisfying lives, but most of whom continue to fall back into homelessness and despair. More information about the book is given in a longer, academic review that quotes several sources commenting on the searing portrait of men and women and how their lives are affected by our failing drug laws. Despite Mayor Newsom's laudable efforts to find housing for the homeless, much more is needed. During economic hard times let's not forget others who are suffering much more than we are.

How can I possibly understand the crisis?

As we try to follow news about the financial crisis that's hit us all, most of us wonder what's meant by all the jargon tossed about by reporters and commentators. Many people who are not trained in economics have had to try to learn a lot of terms very quickly and many of us have failed. At last we have a helpful source online. It's called the Financial Crisis for Beginners and it's part of a blog written for the general public by experts in the financial field. The blog itself, called The Baseline Scenario, provides frequent updates of what's going on in the world of finance. The authors also write articles for the New York Times and the Atlantic, which can be located through the blog. Not all of it is easy reading, but the writing is clear and the subject is important. It's worth spending some time trying to understand what's going on. It may not make you feel better, but at least you'll feel a little less confused and helpless in the face of all the changes we've seen.

New way to follow election

Every conflict in recent years has brought a new media format into its own. Just as the 1991 Iraq war made CNN famous, so the Iranian election and the turmoil that followed has brought www.twitter.com into its own. The tweets from Iran and from Iranian sympathizers around the world has provided a running commentary on what is going on inthe country at a time when mainstream media are having difficulty getting and sending information. Take a look at these images sent through a tweet to thousands of people around the world. While Iranian officials appear to be trying to close down access to cell phones and the Internet people are still managing to send out tweets, changing their location and access to avoid detection. Whatever happens next, people around the world have been alerted to the power of twitter and the media landscape has changed once again.

Figuring out the costs

One of the most popular topics of conversation these days among Americans trying hard to understand the debate over healthcare is the issue of whether higher cost bring better care. A number of articles have discussed the Dartmouth studies on regional differences in the cost of healthcare to patients covered by Medicare. Today's N.Y. Times provides an overview of those studies by one of the researchers involved. Although there are some questions raised by critics, such as questions about whether people in some parts of the country are just sicker than others, the evidence seems overwhelming that much of the difference comes from the attitudes and practices of the doctors and hospitals involved. Let's hope the educators developing curriculum for medical schools are taking a serious look at the results of these studies and designing courses that train doctors to consider the implications of their decisions on the nation's healthcare. Our hopes for true and lasting reform in healthcare depend as much on our young doctors as on lawmaker's decisions. And while we're at it, let's reconsider covering more of the costs of medical education so young doctors don't face the burden of overwhelming debt that conflicts with their desire to give service where it is needed most.

Taking out the garbage

San Francisco has its challenges, and now it seems that garbage is one of them. Many of us in the city have been separating garbage into blue, black or green bins for years now, but this has not been done all over the city. Now a strict new law will make it mandatory for everyone to participate in this recycling effort. If this system is successful it will cut down on San Francisco's production of greenhouses gases and make the environment better for all of us. Speaking as one who has sorted garbage for several years now, I must admit there are still questions that come up--where do milk cartons go? what about light bulbs? which kind of bulb? Citizens will get new lists of types of materials suitable for each bin, but be prepared for a few kitchen table arguments, especially with children, about exactly where each item belongs. Don't worry! San Franciscans can cope with earthquakes and mudslides, so we can surely overcome the garbage problem. And it feels so good to get it right!

League moving into a new year

The League of Women Voters of San Francisco held its annual meeting yesterday to approve plans for the coming year and to elect new members to the Board. For more information about plans and directions, check the website www.lwvsf.org during the coming weeks to see our our plans for activities and new directions. After the business meeting, the featured speaker was Robert Cruickshank, the Public Policy Director for the Courage Campaign, which is gathering support for a new California Constitutional Convention to solve some of the many problems facing our state. Robert talked enthusiastically about the possibilityof the people of California getting together to change the dysfunctional system in Sacramento and improve life for all Californians. There are several websites you can follow to keep up with what is happening in the movement for a Constitutional Convention. One is Repair California and another is the webiste Calitics for which Robert is one of the editors. The future looks exciting, so be sure to keep up.

What's changed in healthcare?

The League's Healthcare Forum on May 27 got a lot of members talking about how healthcare has changed over the past fifteen years or so. Looking back to the early 1990s when President Clinton introduced healthcare legislation only to have it turned down, most of us can recognize that costs have gone up and care doesn't seem to have improved much. But now we can turn to some documentation produced by the National LWV to get some hard facts on what the changes have been. Not only do far fewer people have healthcare insurance through an employer, but the many HMOs and other forms of insurance plans that have been developed in recent years do not seem to met the vision of the early 1990s. It's not easy to see how we can move ahead on healthcare in the midst of the severe economic slump we are in, but it's obvious that something has to be done. San Francisco has started an innovative program to provide healthcare for everyone, and the California legislature is considering a bill to provide single-payer health insurance. As citizen we have to keep our eyes on what is being done and persuade our representatives at all levels to make the changes needed to strengthen healthcare for all.

Who are the bad guys?

Listening to a news report this morning I heard a quote from a newly-trained Afghanistani policeman about "fighting the bad guys from the next village". That was the final straw. The term "bad guys" has crept into all our discussions about international affairs and nuclear weapons. Even our presidents have taken to calling our enemies, both the ones we are fighting in wars and those with whom we differ in ideology, "the bad guys". Anyone who has read history knows that enemies in one war often become friends in the next. A country whose political system we dislike is not a country filled with "bad guys". It's a country filled with normal human beings who have ideas that may be wrong or unjust or uninformed. They may be our enemies, but that doesn't make them demons. Calling a temporary enemy a "bad guy" is the habit of six-year-olds on school playgrounds. It's about time our government leaders and our media start speaking adult English and stop using schoolyard taunts. Come on everyone, let's grow up!

Smiling through the gloom

The state of the state of California has become such a source of humor to the rest of the country that we find ourselves mentioned everywhere we look. The idea of the largest state in the country driving itself into bankruptcy strikes outsiders as funny, although it's not very funny to many who live here. Joel Stein, writing in Time magazine, is a resident of california, but he cannot resist pointing out the folly of our endless voting for initiatives most people can't understand. Asking voters to determine how much we should spend on a high-speed rail system or a hospital bond may have seemed like a good idea once, but it is not working out the way it was planned in 1911. Stein joins a long list of writers, politicians and businesspeople in suggesting that it's time to look at our initiative system with a view to revising it. We all want to strengthen democracy, but making decisions on the basis of ad campaigns is not the way to do it.